Tropical Storm Pakhar Morning Update | April 1, 2012

Tropical Storm Pakhar has weakened overnight and is now nearing landfall along the southeastern coast of Vietnam. It was last located approximately 300km southeast of Ho Chi Minh City. Maximum sustained winds have dropped to 75kph gusting to 100kph. Pakhar is moving westward at 5kph.

IR Image from NRLMRY

Fortunately, Pakhar never recovered much strength yesterday. Apparently, dry air and wind shear couldn’t be overcome by Pakhar. However, the storm remains a strong system and the infra-red image still shows cold cloud tops forming near the center. Already, reports of 100mm of rain coming from areas just northeast of Ho Chi Minh. With the approach of Pakhar, we expect 100 to 200mm of rain to fall within the next 24 hours. Furthermore, with the recent movement as it is, we are now expecting Pakhar to pass at or very near Ho Chi Minh later this afternoon. It will then rapidly weaken to a tropical depression as it crosses into Cambodia later tonight. It will then move within 100km east of Phnom Penh and is then forecast to dissipate altogether by Monday morning.

We’ll have round the clock updates throughout today from other contributors as we monitor Pakhar’s landfall. My next update will be later this afternoon. Stay safe everyone!